


In The Woods Somewhere

by FukaiFox



Category: Bloodborne (Video Game), Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Beast transformation, Blood and Gore, Body Horror, M/M, Mentioned Sexual Content, Other, bloodborne au, just a warning, there is no happiness here my friends, this gets pretty graphic with the descriptions of the transformation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-21
Updated: 2018-08-21
Packaged: 2019-04-25 23:33:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,180
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14389434
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FukaiFox/pseuds/FukaiFox
Summary: Gabriel had always told him that The Good Blood could only keep them all so safe for so long, and that the Plague was an inevitable thing.“Jesse, this plague is going to take everyone sooner or later,” he had told him, “and I don’t think there’s anything we’ll be able to do about it. All we can do now is keep everyone we can as safe as possible. One day you’re going to come across someone you used to know, but they’re not gonna know you, kid. Never hesitate, okay?”And Gabriel was right, the Plague did come for everyone eventually.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I was actually writing another Genyatta fic when this suddenly came to be bc In The Woods Somewhere by Hozier came on my Spotify and this was born of it. Enjoy! Sorry if it’s too graphic. Let me know if I should up the rating to explicit.

Well, he thinks, it was only a matter of time. The paranoia had long since claimed him, and he had secluded himself as result. To him, everyone was ready to attack at the slightest movement, he couldn’t trust anyone. But he knew what was actually happening to him, and he was powerless against it. He had seen the Beast Plague take countless others as their minds slowly deteriorated and turned against them, attacking anyone who came near unless they too had the sickness. Hunters like himself were always a risk, usually the most exposed out of everyone, and madness clouded their minds sooner or later. He just never thought it would happen to him so soon. He had watched the Plague take over his mentor, another Hunter by the name of Gabriel. Jesse never knew what exactly became of the man once he finally turned. When he watched Gabriel’s gruesome transformation, the man- the _beast_ had simply let out a nightmarish screech before spreading its large, black wings that were dripping with poison, and it flew away into the Yharnam night sky. And nobody had seen Gabriel since then.

Gabriel had always told him that The Good Blood could only keep them all so safe for so long, and that the Plague was an inevitable thing. _“Jesse, this plague is going to take everyone sooner or later,”_ he had told him _, “and I don’t think there’s anything we’ll be able to do about it. All we can do now is keep everyone we can as safe as possible. One day you’re going to come across someone you used to know, but they’re not gonna know you, kid. Never hesitate, okay?”_

And Gabriel was right, the Plague did come for everyone eventually. Jesse watched it take his mentor, he had watched it take several of his friends, and now it was his turn. He had prayed to the Healing Church for as long as he could, keeping everything that reminded him of who he was close to him: his own hat, the strange little wool cap Gabriel used to keep on his head, his revolver, specially modified in the Workshop by Gabriel just for him as a gift when he joined the Hunters, and a locket around his neck.

The locket.

Jesse wheezes and suddenly clutches the golden pendant around his neck, tugging it off and breaking the weak chain to hold it in his palm, pressing a small button on top so it clicks open, and he lets out a pathetic whine as he looks at the picture inside.

Hanzo.

He was the brother of another Hunter that Jesse used to run with sometimes before Gabriel fell to the Plague, but he was also the love of his life. They had met on the night of the hunt a few years ago and ever since they had been inseparable. They went on hunts together, had saved each other’s lives countless times, but once Jesse had noticed himself slowly succumbing to the Plague, he had simply left in the middle of the night, leaving behind only a note of apology for Hanzo to find in the morning. Jesse sobs as he looks over the photo, clutching it tight in his fist as if it was something that could save him, something that would hold the transformation back and keep him sane. He falls to his knees in grief, choked sobs echoing off the trees in the forest and he prays. He prays to the Healing Church, mumbling to himself between shuddering breaths.

“L-let us pray, let us wish... to p-pa-partake in c-comm-munion...” he says quietly, body like lead in the dirt, holding the locket to his chest right above his heart.

_Were it not for fear, death would go unlamented._

The prayer still holds strong in his brain, a ringing reminder that Hanzo will miss him, and if he finds Jesse a wandering, frenzied beast, that he will understand why he had to go. He had seen what happened to Father Gascoigne. The poor man had stayed with his family while he struggled with the Plague, had often forgotten his wife and daughters and they had a special music box they played just for him when he came home from the hunt. He had ended up accidentally slaughtering his wife in the Oedon Chapel graveyard in a fit of madness. Jesse shudders at the thought of doing that to Hanzo and pulls his hands closer in to himself, pressing his forehead down to the dirt as he continues to sob out his prayers. He had never been one so devout to the Church that he prayed like some of the others, but he didn’t know what else to do. All he could do was chant teary prayers to whatever deity or Great One that was listening.

Over his cries, Jesse can hear the sound of twigs snapping and leaves crunching underfoot, and he quickly turns towards the sound. Oh, please, no. He can’t have anyone around when it takes him, he can’t bear the thought of hurting an innocent, and he tries to get up and run away, but his legs tremble far too much and he collapses right back into the dirt. Someone is calling out. It’s a person, possibly another Hunter, but something about their voice is so familiar to Jesse, but he can’t place it. Jesse pants heavily, his breath coming out in puffs of steam, practically oozing Beasthood. He lets out an anguished cry and curls into himself further.

“Go away! P-please, just leave!!” he shouts, hoping whoever’s stumbled across him will see what’s happening and run away, or, he hopes for a brief flickering moment they might end his pain for him before he turns. Jesse can feel his gut start to blaze hot, and his mind fogs, and the forest around him spins. The footsteps come closer, the voice louder and more clear, unmistakable in its tone of haughtiness accompanied with an odd accent, but Jesse simply can’t place it. There’s a smell on the wind too, something like the incense burned in the Chapel, and it makes him retch as it repels the Beasthood taking over him.

“Leave!” Jesse calls out weakly and he looks down at the locket once more, wanting to take in Hanzo’s face one last time and he whimpers. The footfalls are coming faster now, more urgent, and the smell of the incense is so potent on his overly sensitive nose that he cries out pathetically and kicks his feet out, trying his best to crawl away from it. Jesse looks at the locket again and whispers an apology to the man in the photo, over and over just repeating how sorry he is and how much he regrets everything, that he wishes he had said something and not left Hanzo to simply wonder what happened to his beloved gunslinger.

Jesse doesn’t even realize the footsteps have stopped.

The person who has discovered him is still, frozen in place. Jesse doesn’t wonder why; He must be a right spectacle. The odor of the incense is overwhelming, but there’s nothing Jesse can do. But there’s something else under the incense if he focuses on it, something as familiar as the voice, something that smells like safety, but he doesn’t know why. The smell makes him recoil and cry out, suddenly wishing for home, wishing for his lover’s comfort as the Plague takes him. He thinks, if Hanzo had been with him, if Jesse had stayed and explained everything, that he would be alright and would accept his fate more easily. But now he regrets.

With a sudden blood chilling scream, Jesse feels something in him give way with a loud sickening snap, bones suddenly jerking out of place and breaking inside of him, relocating themselves and expanding in his body. The pain is nothing like he’s ever experienced. He can feel his teeth shifting as his jaw grows and changes shape, bones in his legs and feet bending in ways they were never meant to and snapping, only to mend themselves once they had found their new places. Jesse tries to lift himself off the ground, but when he rises he loses his balance and falls back to the dirt. His legs aren’t meant for standing on their own anymore, but he can manage with his legs and one arm, which he can only watch with horror as his fingers jerk and shatter themselves, curving in with long black fingernails like talons at the ends. His other hand is still holding the locket tight, determined not to drop it. His back bows inward before roughly jerking back out in a hunch, his shoulder blades popping from their places and raising themselves to conform to his new spine shape, and now Jesse can only stand on all fours like the beast he is. Brown fur covers his body now, his clothes ripping at their seams and falling off in shreds around him.

Jesse sobs brokenly, and it comes out like a high pitched whine, nothing more than an animal in pain trying to call for help. He’s too weak and in too much agony to even try and fight the transformation anymore, letting it break and shatter his body, and he can only cry as he begins to choke on his own teeth, spitting them out in a bloody puddle when new, razor sharp ones take their place. The flesh of his cheeks is torn wide and raw when his nose finally elongates to join his lower jaw, his face now more canine in nature than anything resembling a human. Jesse pants heavily and sobs into the dirt, his eyes cracking open for just a moment to see the poor unfortunate soul witnessing his fall, and his eyes fall on a shimmering gold ribbon tied in the person’s hair, and a ratty, torn black cloak of some kind wrapped around their shoulders, with a bow and quiver on their back. Jesse doesn’t know why, but just seeing this person makes his chest clench painfully as if he’s been stabbed and lets out an anguished scream into the air, standing on his three legs with his back bowed and head thrown to the night sky, talons raking lines in the dirt. His voice screeches now, no longer the deep rolling timber it once was, and he just screams his agony throughout the forest.

With one final shriek, Jesse falls limp to the ground, panting as the transformation is finally complete. He slowly rises to his feet as the pain subsides into nothing more than a dull throbbing ache, three legs on the ground while one hand still holds the locket close to him. He isn’t sure why, he just knows he needs to keep it there and protect it. Twigs suddenly snap and small pebbles crunch nearby, and Jesse’s elongated ear flicks up and turns to the noise, and Jesse’s head follows it to see the intruder, and he growls, turning his whole body to face the Hunter, heavy weight shaking the ground beneath him. His bright eyes shine in the moonlight that acts like a spotlight on him and he snarls, taking in a deep breath before roaring at a deafening volume at the man that stands in front of him who pulls the bow from his back.

And Hanzo knocks an arrow.


	2. A Hunter Is A Hunter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hanzo’s a Hunter. He knows Beasthood when he sees it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn’t plan on writing a part 2 for this. I wanted to, but I didn’t know how to do it. Then I was suddenly hit with the need to write it anyway, and here it is. I’ve been working with this almost since I posted the first one oops. This chapter is Hanzo’s point of view, and takes place during the events of chapter 1. This chapter was harder to write, and it actually made me tear up at the end. 
> 
> Enjoy!

Jesse is gone.

He’s been gone for weeks, maybe months. Hanzo doesn’t know. 

What he does know is that he woke one morning to find Jesse gone, a note in his place on the pillow beside Hanzo’s own. The gunslinger had left in the middle of the night, with nothing that he couldn’t carry and the clothes on his back. His revolver was gone, and a satchel of bullets, but nothing else. No blood vials, no marks, no spare clothes, not even his black cloak had been taken. Hanzo wonders if Jesse left it behind just for him as a gift.

A goodbye. 

Hanzo picks up the note for the hundredth time since Jesse’s leave and traces over the inked words as if they’ll reveal something to him.

 

_I’m sorry. I love you._

_\- Jesse_

 

He stays in their home, afraid to leave in case Jesse came back and he missed him, but after a few moons with no sign of the hunter’s return, Hanzo made the decision to leave and seek him out. Whatever Jesse thought was too much for Hanzo to handle couldn’t have been such a problem, they could talk about it. He would welcome Jesse home with open arms if only Hanzo could find him. Being a hunter was a hard life, one very rarely graced with the kind of relationship they had, but they had been making it work for so long. What happened? Sure, they had their arguments and rough patches like any other couple, but nothing so bad that Jesse would leave, as far as Hanzo could remember. Something must have been wrong.

 

He travels for weeks, through villages and towns all claimed by the plague in one way or another. He even goes so far as to travel to the blocked off Old Yharnam, only to be scolded by the defected Powder Keg that made his home there. He makes sure not to harm any of the crazed beasts that attempt to maul him so as not to draw the old hunter’s ire, and when he finally climbs to the top of the clock tower, the man in grey is surprised to see him. He introduces himself as Djura, but he offers no help. He’s never even heard Jesse McCree’s name until that day. Apologies, and the best of luck to Hanzo, and the archer simply sighs and takes his leave, pulling a yellowed scrap of paper from his pack and turning it so the sigil faces him, then closing his eyes as he presses it to his forehead.

 

It’s been about another week since then, and he’s running thin. Hardly anyone has been of any help to him, too suspicious of the hunters to say anything to Hanzo but hasty goodbyes or aggressive demands for him to leave. Not even McCree’s adopted little sister Olivia has any good news for him.

 

_“I don’t know where he could have gone, Hanzo... I don’t think he wants to be found, not this time.”_

That’s what she had told him, and if Olivia couldn’t track somebody then they were either dead, or better than her, and both of them refused to believe either possibility. Even when Jesse ran on his own, there was always some way to find him if he was needed in an emergency, and Hanzo refused to believe Jesse could be dead. He was too skilled, too careful. He left the woman’s small residence with a promise that he would find Jesse, and he set off into the night.

 

He found himself in such a horrid place. There was something wrong with this forest, he could feel it in the air. The trees seemed to be moving, the paths changing their curves, the least of his worries the venomous snakes that he could hear hissing and slithering in every direction. Surely Jesse hadn’t come into these woods alone? Not after all the horror stories he would tell about this place, how he had lost others on hunts, seen creatures of the same breed mercilessly slaughter each other. Vipers, deranged plague victims both beast and snake, boars, witches, rabid wild hounds, all of it just set the scene of a nightmare. Hanzo couldn’t believe Jesse would have come here, even in his most desperate times, yet all it took was a boot-print in the mud that made him continue. He really had run into this place...

 

He hates being here. Everything about the fog here makes his body tingle with the need to run, keeps his heart racing in his chest and his breathing far from steady. Every noise he hears makes him pull his bow closer to his body, arrow perpetually knocked and ready to be pulled and released into whatever creature had found him. Hanzo can hardly rest, too aware of everything to even sit himself for just a while, even if he has some incense from the Church to burn and keep the beasts at bay. He has to keep going, he has to find Jesse.

And so he walks.

The longer he stays and the further in he travels, the more signs of Jesse he finds. More footprints, the occasional discarded cigar end, a few bullet casings, and a ripped, bloody bandage, which makes Hanzo’s heart leap into his chest.

 

Jesse’s been hurt, and badly if the amount of blood soaked into the cloth is any indication. The thing is rancid, a disgusting brownish-green, but he knows the smell of rotten blood, not just as a member of his family, but as a hunter as well. He can’t tell how old the bandages are, but he knows they were Jesse’s. There’s nothing he can do with them however, so he simply buries them under the dirt and mud so the smell can’t be detected and tracked by anything undesirable, and he goes on his way.

 

He’s deeper in these woods now than he had ever wanted to be, days after entering, when he hears it; the broken cry of a man in pain, and it’s heartbreaking. A victim of the plague perhaps, or some other Hunter unlucky enough to find themselves in this cursed place. He can help them in one way or another, depending on their situation, and so he changes his path and heads towards the noise. After all, it could be Jesse.

 

“...hello?” he calls, hoping for some response. What he gets is more sobs and anguished moans of pain, louder, closer, and this time he can hear the familiar deep timbre of the man he’s known and loved for years, could never forget it even if he wanted to. It’s a voice that always says his name so sweetly and full of love, always there to comfort him when he needs it most. He hadn’t heard this voice in so long he almost begins to cry, recalling when he had heard it last.

A long night of passion and love, legs twisted together and blankets clenched between fingers, voices breaking in their throats and muffled into skin, rising in pitch and volume until it’s suddenly over, and they’re laying side-by-side in their bed, Jesse whispering a soft _“I love you,”_ into Hanzo’s hair just before the archer dozes off. When he wakes in the morning, Jesse is gone, with a note in his place.

 

He kicks it into high gear, slinging his bow over his chest and running towards the sounds.

“Jesse!” Hanzo calls out, the wounded cries only getting louder, and as he draws closer he realizes his beloved isn’t just crying.

He’s praying.

 

_Remain wary of the frailty of men. Their wills are weak, minds young._

_Let us pray, let us wish to partake in communion._

_Let us partake in communion, and feast upon the old blood._

_Our thirst for blood satiates us, soothes our fears._

 

Hanzo knows these prayers by heart with the amount of time in the Healing Church he’s spent. Jesse doesn’t pray. He’s only a Hunter because he knows it’s the right thing to do, not for any kind of blood-worshiping religious mission. He calls for Jesse again, drawing closer, leaves and twigs crunching and snapping under his boots, and the prayers stop, and what follows both makes his heart swell and shatter with relief and sorrow. He sees a faint figure doubled over in the mud, one hand on their chest while the other tries to hold them up. He watches as they try to stand, but their legs tremble and collapse, sending them pathetically back into the mud.

“Jesse!!”

 

“Go away! P-please, just leave!!”

 

The plea is desperate, voice broken with tears of sorrow and a pain Hanzo can’t even begin to describe. How can he leave? This was Jesse, Hanzo had found him after so many long weeks of searching. He steps closer to the small clearing. They’re surrounded by trees, but the moonlight shines perfectly above them, illuminating the area perfectly, and oh, how Hanzo doesn’t understand how his heart can shatter any smaller.

“....Jesse...”

He sees the man he loves, animalistic fear in his glazed eyes as he tries to get away from Hanzo, whimpering and pushing uselessly at the ground as he backs himself up against the trunk and exposed roots of an enormous tree. Jesse shouts again, “Leave!”, but his voice is weak. The distance between them is quite large, but Hanzo can see the steam puffing out with every deep breath from Jesse, despite the warm, thick humidity of the forest. He can see the sharp lines Jesse’s nails, now claws, have raked into the dirt.

 

Hanzo’s a Hunter, and he knows Beasthood when he sees it. Jesse is lost to his sickness. There’s nothing that can be done for him. Hanzo can only watch as Jesse curls in on himself again and sobs into the ground, whispering apologies into his fist. At first, Hanzo is confused, and then he sees the moonlight glinting off a small golden chain dangling from Jesse’s first, and he recognizes it. The locket he had gifted to Jesse which he knew to carry his own portrait. Hanzo is crushed by the truth of what exactly is happening. He’s been searching for Jesse for weeks, months even, and he finally finds him on the verge of transformation, already so far gone in his sickness that he can’t recognize his own lover’s face, yet knows the locket is still something to treasure.

 

What follows will haunt Hanzo’s nightmares for the rest of his life. He watches helplessly as Jesse suddenly screams, his bones roughly snapping in and out of place, reshaping to whatever form the plague will transform him. Jesse’s spine arches unnaturally, vertebrae sticking out like ridges, bones in his arms and legs bending in ways the human body was never meant to, expanding and elongating into horrific gangly limbs with razor sharp talons at their tips. Jesse can only stand on his fours now. Three, Hanzo corrects, as Jesse still never drops the necklace and keeps it clutched to his chest like the precious treasure it is. He wants to look away, wants to leave and have never come across this horrible spectacle, but he’s stuck still, forced to watch Jesse scream in agony as he coughs up his own teeth, and his jaw snaps open wide, stretching his skin and tearing it as his skull reshapes itself, and Jesse collapses.

 

Hanzo sees him tremble, but he still can’t move. He sees just the barest gleam from one of Jesse’s new blood red eyes as it stares at him, and the last human part of Jesse’s brain must remember something he sees, because the man is suddenly contorting again, rising up on his three legs and letting out the most desolate, despairing, anguished scream so far, back arched in and head thrown back to the sky, looking up to the moon all too much like the beast he is. The voice devolves from that of the man to the screech of a monster, echoing through the forest at such a volume that Hanzo is sure that it could even be heard back in Yharnam. And with a final shriek, Jesse falls limp once more and goes still, the only movement from him the heaving of his chest. Hanzo watches silently, knowing that his grief will have to wait, as the beast before him sluggishly rises to his feet. His steps are heavy, shaking the ground as he stands, one arm and both legs on the ground while the other arm still holds the locket close, like he can’t bear to part with it, though he might not even know why.

 

Hanzo releases a shaky breath and steps forward, trembling in every limb as the beast hears his footsteps shuffle leaves and snaps twigs and crunches rocks, and a large furry brown ear twitches and swivels in his direction, followed by the growling face of the beast. The fur is long and wiry, matted with blood, and the eyes are a deep glowing red that shine in the moonlight. Hanzo wants to drop to his knees and cry, beg forgiveness for what happened to Jesse, apologize for not being enough to trust with whatever had happened, and apologize for what he had to do now, but still he stands. The beast snarls at him and draws back, puffing up to make itself look larger, and it releases a deafening roar, a warning before attack. Hanzo slowly lifts the bow from his shoulder and shudders, biting his lip to the point of bleeding as tears gather in his eyes.

 

He knocks an arrow, raises his bow, and pulls back the string.

 

“I’m sorry, I love you...”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So how was it? If you like it, please leave a comment telling me what you liked most! I’m contemplating writing a third part, detailing their fight, but I’m not the best at action sequences. Let me know if that’s something you would like, or if there’s anything else you would like to see in any future fics!  
> Thanks for reading!

**Author's Note:**

> When I imagined Jesse’s transformation, think of it as a fucked up mix of Father Gascoigne, Vicar Amelia, and the Cleric Beast.


End file.
